Ans. i) Payment outside India towards a permissible current account transaction [in accordance with the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management (Current Account Transactions) Rules, 2000] and permissible capital account transaction [in accordance with the Foreign Exchange Management (Permissible Capital Account Transactions) Regulations, 2000].

ii) Payment in foreign exchange towards cost of goods purchased from a 100 percent Export Oriented Unit or a Unit in (a) Export Processing Zone or (b) Software Technology Park or (c) Electronic Hardware Technology Park

iii) Payment of customs duty in accordance with the provisions of the Foreign Trade Policy of the Central Government for the time being in force.

iv) Trade related loans/advances, extended by an exporter holding such account to his importer customer outside India, subject to compliance with the Foreign Exchange Management (Borrowing and Lending in Foreign Exchange) Regulations, 2000.

v) Payment in foreign exchange to a person resident in India for supply of goods/services including payments for airfare and hotel expenditure.

Yes. Cooling period is the time up to which banks wait after receiving provisional credit for the amount of cheque in their Nostro account for possible return of the cheque by the drawee bank under the provisions of the US laws, before giving credit to the customers. Cooling period is dependent on the mode and area of collection and varies from 5-8 days for cheques in New York area and 15-21 days for other cities collected under CLA mode. However, under the FCS mode, banks receive final credit in their Nostro account without any recourse to recall. It does not involve cooling period as this is already factored into by the CBs before releasing the final credit.

Ans. Section 2(1) (i) of the PSS Act 2007 defines a payment system to mean a system that enables payment to be effected between a payer and a beneficiary, involving clearing, payment or settlement service or all of them, but does not include a stock exchange (Section 34 of the PSS Act 2007 states that its provisions will not apply to stock exchanges or clearing corporations set up under stock exchanges). It is further stated by way of an explanation that a “payment system” includes the systems enabling credit card operations, debit card operations, smart card operations, money transfer operations or similar operations.

All systems (except stock exchanges and clearing corporations set up under stock exchanges) carrying out either clearing or settlement or payment operations or all of them are regarded as payment systems. All entities operating such systems will be known as system providers. Also all entities operating money transfer systems or card payment systems or similar systems fall within the definition of a system provider. To decide whether a particular entity operates the payment system, it must perform either the clearing or settlement or payment function or all of them.

No interest shall be paid for deposits made in this scheme.

With effect from February 1, 2017 limits on cash withdrawals from ATMs have been removed. Banks may, at their discretion, have their own operating limits as was the case before November 8, 2016, subject to the overall cash withdrawal limit for an account.

Response

The 'Basic Savings Bank Deposit Account' would be subject to provisions of PML Act and Rules and RBI instructions on Know Your Customer (KYC) / Anti-Money Laundering (AML) for opening of bank accounts issued from time to time. BSBDA can also be opened with simplified KYC norms. However, if BSBDA is opened on the basis of Simplified KYC, the accounts would additionally be treated as “BSBDA-Small account” and would be subject to the conditions stipulated for such accounts as indicated in our circulars RPCD.CO.RCB.AML.BC.No.63/07.40.00/2010-11 dated April 26, 2011 and RPCD.CO.RRB.AML.BC.No.15/03.05.33(E)/2011-12 dated August 8, 2011.

Yes. The complaint can be filed by one’s authorized representative (other than an advocate).

The re-pricing of the swap would be done as given in the illustration at the end of the FAQ.

Ans. Yes, please refer to the Master Directions on Reporting (/en/web/rbi/-/notifications/master-direction-reporting-under-foreign-exchange-management-act-1999-updated-as-on-may-12-2023-lt-span-gt-10202). The registration is required to be done once the AD bank’s approval for the establishment of office is issued.

Ans. The directions are applicable to loans sanctioned on or after April 1, 2022. Accordingly, pricing of the existing loans of NBFC-MFIs i.e., sanctioned prior to April 1, 2022 shall continue to be as per the guidelines applicable as on March 31, 2022. As other REs were already free to decide pricing of loans sanctioned, they are allowed to review and revise interest rates applicable to the existing loans also, subject to compliance with the relevant guidelines.

In the case of banks, especially foreign banks, earlier specifically permitted to store the banking data abroad, they may continue to do so; however, in respect of domestic payment transactions, the data shall be stored only in India, whereas for cross border payment transactions, the data may also be stored abroad as indicated earlier.

Yes. The complaint can be filed through an authorized representative of the complainant (other than an advocate).

Ans. Response to Q.No. 2 may be referred to for the applicable types of transactions.

Ans. The following payments are eligible to be settled through ACU:-

1. for export / import transaction between ACU member countries on deferred payment terms; and

2. not declared ineligible as mentioned under Q.10

Note:- Trade transaction with Myanmar may be settled in any freely convertible currency, in addition to the ACU mechanism.

Ans. Yes. The TReDS could deal with both receivables factoring as well as reverse factoring.

Ans. The IFSC number can be obtained by the remitter (customer) from his / her bank branch. Alternatively, it is available on the cheque leaf of the beneficiary. This code number / bank branch information can be communicated by the beneficiary to the remitting customer. The list of IFSCs is also available on the RBI website at the link https://rbi.org.in/Scripts/Bs_viewRTGS.aspx?Category=5. The list is updated on a fortnightly basis.

The instructions in the circular dated September 7, 2020 is applicable in the case of all borrowers in respect of whom resolution is being undertaken in terms of Part B of the Annex to the circular dated August 6, 2020 on Resolution Framework.

Response: The cardholder shall be provided option to choose any date as the starting or closing day of the billing cycle at least once. Further, card-issuers may provide the option to modify the billing cycle through multiple channels such as helpline, dedicated e-mail-id, Interactive Voice Response (IVR), internet banking, mobile-application and any other modes.